[AAR] Battle at Ajmunds Bridge 1361

[CaptainHaddonCollider]

Hey all,
We had our second game of the Invasion of Gotland mini-campaign yesterday, and I thought I might as well share some of the action as we documented the whole thing anyway.

In the second scenario the Danes have established a beachhead on Gotland, and despite the setback caused by the narrow defeat at Fröjel earlier, the danish steamroller of mercenaries and ombudshær troops are heading inland towards the city of Visby. The Gutes are trying to assemble their yeoman forces, withdrawing before the Danes until they have enough strength for a stand. Now they have reached the Bridge of Ajmund, which would present them with an opportunity to delay the Danes even further. The Gutes must get as many men across the bridge before they destroy it, while the Danes must capture the bridge intact and continue the advance towards Visby, destroying as many Gute warbands in the process as possible.

The OOB in this battle is pretty much as before, but this time the Gutes no longer count as fierce foot, but yeoman infantry. The Danes have changed the bidowers for a unit of Mounted Serjeants.

The initial setup was like so: Gute units on their way towards the bridge, with the Danes in hot pursuit.



A couple of peasants were discussing how to best turn their bridge into a pile of rocks, blocking the danish invasion force, while others took to the roads, trying to escape the wave of fire and murder:






The danish line of advance:



The first Gute unit manages to activate itself, beginning the crossing:



The Danes are advancing, but the Gute bidowers on the flanks are doing a very good job of keeping them at bay. As the danish Mounted troops arrive the Gutes move rapidly down the lines, crossing the bridge with a second unit:






The Danes dither and confusion starts spreading through the ranks, giving the Gutes time to get even more troops across the bridge:





The danish leader tries to charge through the Gute lines, but the toll taken by the bidowers have left his men tired and depleted. In the end his men flees the field, making the danish host pull back:





The Gute units move across, leaving only the bidowers to face the Danes. At this point the Mounted Serjeants decided it was time for them to enter the game, and the charged directly into the skirmishers, hoping to capture the bridge in the process:







The Mounted Serjeants manage to kill off the skirmishers, leaving the bridge open. However, the yeomen infantry counterattacks and take the bridge back, destroying it and making good the Gutes escape. Another (surprising!) Gute victory:



Another enjoyable game of Lion Rampant! This time my danish opponent was hampered by a lot of botched activation rolls, especially to his Mounted Serjeants, who didn't play an actual role in the game until the very end, where they nearly won the game all by themselves. The danish infantry didn't do much, being slowed down by skirmishing fire and some unimpressive charges at the Gute lines. The bowmen just wouldn't activate, which the Danes needed, to whittle down the Gute yeomen for the rest of the army to capitalize on. The success of the Gutes in this battle would give them an additional unit yeomen in the next battle.

[Dr. Zombie]

Another great looking game.

[Larry R]

Very nice, thanks for the AAR!

[Marine0846]

I like the look of the battle.
Bad activation rolls early in a turn does not help.
But the other side loves it.

[Dalauppror]

Exellent AAR !

[Sunjester]

Excellent report and a very nice looking game.

[Phil Portway]

Great looking game and great write up!

[Gibby]

Excellent battle report, and lovely models too!

Great game.
I love the way you've made the failed activations part of the game's narrative. Some criticise LR saying, 'I don't like not being able to activate all my units.' And I always think they're missing the point seeing that in purely game mechanic terms - like you, they should be seeing it as part of the battle's story. It's what makes the game fun and interesting.

Well said. I think that's important to remember in all rulesets really - with intentional mechanics anyway. Seeing things in a narrative tint is crucial to not getting TOO frustrated by such mechanics.

[CaptainHaddonCollider]

Thanks for all the props! The narrative of the game has always been at the centre for me, and usually for the people I game with. I guess it's why I enjoy LR so much, as the game has an inbuilt randomness, much like what you would expect medieval skirmishes to have.

Couple of questions. How did you score the game? What Glory bonuses did you award for units crossing the bridge? Did one side get more points than the other for each unit across? What about destroying the bridge? How did you 'score' that?
For me it looked like the Gutes would have an easy time of it - sacrifice one unit to hold up the Danes whilst the others pile across the bridge.
Campaign games always make for a more enjoyable experience. Great reading, ta.

The game was scored by adding up destroyed units points at the end, the Gute army getting an extra 4 points for ruining the bridge. So for them it was all about preserving their units by getting them across the river and then getting it knocked into the water. The bridge would be destroyed once the last Gute unit had crossed, which is why the activations became especially crucial in this scenario.
While one could argue that the Gutes would have an easy time of it, the yeoman units are very much inferior to Serjeants, and very much vulnerable to missilefire. In this case the Danes came close to taking the bridge before the last of the Gutes had crossed, with archers supporting their Mounted troops from the riverbank. The Mounted Serjeants went through two units of bidowers and a single yeoman unit like a hot knife through butter, and it was only a desperate counterattack by one of the yeoman units and some fast running skirmishers that saved the day.